


our love is six feet under

by mad_magic



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Angst, Clarke Is Back Bitches, F/M, Facing Your Demons, Minor Violence, Post 6x05, Speculation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-04
Updated: 2019-06-04
Packaged: 2020-04-07 19:58:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,703
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19092073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mad_magic/pseuds/mad_magic
Summary: Death is not peaceful. Not at all like she expected it to be. Not like she hoped for all the lost souls she had sent to death’s door—some deserving, some not.Clarke had welcomed her own death once. This time is different. She had hope for something better than violence and struggling to survive. She was so close to forgiving herself. So close to a true glimpse of happiness, she clings on that much harder when the darkness reaches out to her.No,Clarke screams inside her mind. A single tear rolls down her cheek. She’s not done fighting yet. She’s not done living....Post 6.05 Speculation. Clarke fights to come back to herself.





	our love is six feet under

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys! I seem to be on a writing streak lately haha. Thanks so much for all the lovely comments on my other fics <3 You have no idea how inspiring your words are. 
> 
> This is a speculation fic for s6 and what Clarke might be encountering in her own mind. I wanted our girl to fight for herself, while Bellamy and the others save her from the outside. Featuring the return of Jake Griffin :-) 
> 
> **Note:** The fic was inspired by Six Feet Under by Billie Eilish and [this](https://still-watching.tumblr.com/post/185227542123/chants-de-lune-lights-a-candle-let-clarke) post by still-watching on tumblr

 

* * *

 

 

Death is not peaceful. Not at all like she expected it to be. Not like she hoped for all the lost souls she had sent to death’s door—some deserving, some not.

Clarke had welcomed her own death once. She embraced the flames of Praimfaya, certain that her fight was over, but she accepted it if that meant her friends got to live on. Six years ago, she was ready to die because she had given all that she had and now it was time for rest.

 _This_ time is different. She had hope for something better than violence and struggling to survive. Thanks to Monty and Harper’s sacrifice, she had a second chance. Clarke could make amends with those she had hurt. She was _so close_ to forgiving herself.

So close to a true glimpse of happiness, she clings on that much harder when the darkness reaches out to her.

 _No,_ Clarke screams inside her mind. A single tear rolls down her cheek. She’s not done fighting yet. She’s not done living.

But these monsters that stand over her frozen body don’t care about that. They don’t care about her at all. Her body is just a vessel for the daughter they lost.

A part of her can understand that. These monsters, just like all the ones Clarke has faced in the past, are humans too. She understands Russell’s grief, his desperation to have his daughter back. Clarke would do anything for Madi, but maybe not _this_.

_Madi._

Her heart splinters open at the thought of her own daughter. Clarke will never see her grow up. She’s leaving Madi alone when her daughter still needs her. Her paralyzed body shakes inside with anguish.

Clarke sees the faces of those she loves, the ones she will never get to say goodbye to. Her mom. Bellamy. Raven. Murphy. Emori. Echo. Miller. Kane. The list is a long one, almost as long as her sins. Those deeds will die with her now, unforgiven.

 _I’m sorry,_ Clarke thinks one last time. _Forgive me_.

Bellamy’s face swims up in her mind, pained, remorseful. She sees him standing before the end of the world, Damocles’ Sword swinging over their heads, yet his back is straight with resolve to not leave his friends behind ever again.

He’ll blame himself for this. For not being able to save her. Clarke doesn’t want to leave him either. She’s grateful for her last words to him, reassuring Bellamy of his importance to her. But there is so much more to say.

Her love for him will follow her into the grave. Bellamy will never know how she feels.

Clarke isn’t afraid to die. The difference this time is; it isn’t her choice. She isn’t going quietly into death. Trapped inside her own unresponsive body, she fights back violently against the hands that come to collect her.

She has more to say, more to fight for, but death silences her.

 

* * *

 

The darkness doesn’t last forever. It has a beginning and an end.

Clarke isn’t sure how long she is under. It feels like a second; it feels like an eternity. Like she’s been asleep in a tomb for a thousand years. Then her eyes crack open and there is bright light surrounding her.

She’s flat on her back in a white room. She pushes herself up slowly, her limbs weak and shaky. When Clarke stands and her eyes adjust to the pristine whiteness, she realizes that is isn’t a room but a hallway she’s in, extending for miles in both directions.

There is a white door that faces her, as blank as the walls and floors. When Clarke turns her head, she can see more doors spanning out every few feet, as far as her eye can see. Doors on the left, doors on the right.

_What is this place?_

It is as cold and empty as any lab she’s been in. There are no windows, no points of entry or exit. Clarke can’t fathom how she woke up here like she was just dropped into an endless hallway.

Her head throbs with excruciating pain when she tries to remember how she got here. Static fills her brain. Clarke can recall feeling cold, vaguely, but nothing else.

She’s alone with just a door to answer her. So Clarke turns the knob and opens it.

She steps through the threshold into another hallway, only this one is familiar. Her body shudders. Recognition crawls under skin, like Wonkru’s worms. Clarke remembers the corridor of rooms with small, circular windows. She knows what lay inside them, the sterile white beds, the lone Starry Night painting on the wall.

_Mount Weather._

Her feet pull to a halt in front of a particular room. It’s hers. Only this window’s glass is shattered down the middle.

Clarke peers inside, unsure what she expects to find. Maybe herself, in spotless white clothes, screaming to be let out. Screaming for Monty across the hall, for her mother, for anyone.

But no. When Clarke looks, she sees a limp body laying on the floor. Her brown eyes stare up at nothing, wide and frozen. Black hair lays around her, like spilled ink on the white tile. Her throat is sliced, leaking bright red blood that runs in a trail down to the cause of her death.

A shard of glass. It’s Maya’s body that glares up at Clarke. And there is the glass that Clarke held to her throat, terrorizing the poor girl with as soon as she had the chance.

Bile burns in Clarke’s throat. _You killed her._

“No,” Clarke gasps, stumbling back from the window. “No!”

Her denials are meaningless. Clarke may have not slit her throat, but she carries the stain of Maya’s death on her soul. The blood of an innocent on her hands. Maya tried to help their people and Clarke repaid her with toxins, sucking the life out of her lungs.

Clarke runs down the hallway to the door she came in through. Tears blur her vision, but she finds her way when her hands smack against the doorway. She staggers through to the other side, expecting to be back in the long white hallway.

The dining hall of Mount Weather faces her. Level 5. It’s the same sight that has plagued Clarke’s nightmares for years now. The aftermath of irradiating the entire level, of sentencing the people of the Mountain to death. The dead bodies are piled on the floor, all staring up at her with blank, sightless eyes.

Clarke has no choice but to look at them. Even as the tears break from her eyes, she can see them clearly. Each face. Each innocent life she took before it’s time.

The weight on top of her is crushing. She can’t bear it. Clarke drops to her knees as the grief and the guilt roll through her, as fresh as the day it happened. She’s never forgotten. That kind of horror follows you like a shadow that hangs over your soul, always keeping a part of you trapped in darkness.

“I’m sorry,” Clarke sobs. “I had to. I’m so sorry.”

Her hand hangs forward, burying her face in her knees. It’s too much to look at. Their blood stains the floor she’s kneeled on. She can smell the odor of death around her, the decaying bodies.

 _Wanheda,_ the voices lash out at her. _Mountain Slayer. Murderer._

Clarke’s shoulders tremble with her sobs. She never wanted this. She just wanted her people to be free, to be safe. That came at a cost and she paid it. She paid it dearly.

A touch on her shoulder startles her, grounds her.

“Bellamy?” Clarke rasps.

She turns her cheek, but it isn’t Bellamy that kneels beside her, his hand heavy and warm. Her father meets her eyes, his own impossibly blue and familiar.

“Dad?” She gasps.

He smiles sadly. “Hey, kiddo.”

Clarke burrows into his arms, pressing her face against his chest. She can smell him again, the scent of his Ark-issued body wash and cologne, and it makes her cry harder.

His large hand cups the back of her head, holding her to him like he’s afraid to let go, too. “I’m here, Clarke. It’s okay, honey.”

“No, it’s not.” She pulls back just enough to look at him through her tears. “What’s going on? What is this place?”

Her own voice shocks her. Clarke sounds like a little girl again, frightened and young. She hasn’t felt this way since the day the Ark Guards came to remove her from her cell and send her to the Ground.

She feels seventeen again, like the girl before Praimfaya, before the City of Light, before the Mountain. The girl who just lost her father and still dreamed of seeing trees for the first time. Clarke thought that girl was long dead.

His hand cupping her cheek, her dad wipes away her running tears. “We’re in your mind, Clarke.”

She stares. “What are you talking about?”

“Your mind,” he repeats patiently. “This is what remains when the Primes take your body.”

The name sends a shock through her system. _Primes._

Pain bursts through her skull. Clarke clutches her head, groaning to herself as the memories come flooding back. She is knocked under the force of them and left drowning. Clarke screams, bloodcurdling and beyond her control.

Faintly, she feels her father’s hands gripping her shoulders. “Clarke!” He yells.

Clarke screams until there is no breath left to draw from. The memories come to her like falling shrapnel, slicing her as they land. She remembers the lab, the table they strapped her down to, the paralytic dart that rendered her immobile. Russell’s tearful blue eyes and Simone’s cold face.

“They killed me,” Clarke tells him, even if it seems her dad already knows. “They took my body for her—for Josephine. I…I’m _dead_.”

So Murphy was right. She’s in Hell. Forced to face her sins for all eternity.

“No,” her dad says. “Clarke, listen to me. You’re not dead. Your consciousness lives on. That’s why I’m here.”

She shakes her head, the words he’s saying both too bizarre and too good to be true. “That’s not possible. Josephine’s mind replaced my own. She controls my body now.”

Her dad steps back, spreading his arms out wide. “Look around, kiddo. What are we doing here then?”

Clarke does look, reluctantly. There’s still standing in Level 5 of Mount Weather where the bodies of their dead litter the floor of the dining hall. Her dead.

She can’t bear to look at him, to see the disgust and disappointment on her father’s face. Her eyes squeeze shut. “We’re here because of _me_. This is my punishment.”

Despair opens inside her, an endless black pit. There is no peace, not for her. Not even in death.

When her father’s voice comes, it is without judgment. Flat, but it manages to echo off the walls of the mountain. “You think you deserve this. You _don’t_ , Clarke. You have to forgive yourself.”

Her head shakes back and forth, almost frantic in her denial. She can’t. How can _anyone_ forgive this? He must think she’s a monster.

“I’m sorry,” Clarke whispers, speaking just to him now and not the dead.

Her eyes open. Her dad is gone. Vanished, like he was never there at all. She must have imagined him, in a feeble attempt to comfort herself. Her time for comfort is over. She has to face what she’s done.

Clarke glances around her, but the Mountain is gone too. She’s back in the long hallway filled with infinite white doors. Now that Clarke knows she’s dead, she understands what these doors mean and why she’s here.

The doors lead to her past sins. This is her Hell. That’s the only explanation for why there are so many rooms. All of her regrets, all of the death she caused, are lined up to relive as her eternal punishment.

Facing down the doors, Clarke feels a chill in her bones. She is truly alone.

Even in those months after Praimfaya, Clarke never felt this deep loneliness. It goes on forever inside her like she’s falling into an abyss with no end. There is no hope of Bellamy and her friends coming home one day. There is no bunker to pray for, to see her mother again.

There is just _her_. Clarke and her memories.

That’s what does it, what sends her to her knees again. She feels the pain of banging against the cold floor, but it makes no difference. The pain is everywhere. It floods through her with nowhere to go, so she chokes on it. Regret and sorrow and loneliness crushing her chest, swamped in her throat.

She never wanted to be alone. Clarke left after Mount Weather as her own penance. She didn’t deserve Bellamy’s absolution, the comfort of her friends after the things she’d done. Atrocities that no one should be forgiven for.

 _What we did,_ Bellamy’s husky voice plays in her memory. _You don’t have to do this alone._

“You’re not here,” Clarke cries. “I _need_ you. And you’re not here.”

_Clarke._

She swears she can almost hear his voice, calling out to her. She used to hallucinate it during those six years on the Ground too. But he isn’t coming back, not this time. Clarke can’t keep herself from breaking apart with the truth of it.

She pushed herself so hard, for so long. Survived for 2,199 days on hope. Clarke always kept fighting, but her fight is over. There is nothing left to do but finally break.

“Clarke.” It’s her dad’s voice now, close to her. “Get up, kiddo. You have to get up.”

“Why?” Clarke demands, blinking through the hot rush of tears. “What’s the point? I have nothing left. _Nothing_.”

His hand lands softly on her back, rubbing in soothing circles. “You have yourself. Your life is worth fighting for, Clarke. And your people still need you.”

“No, they don’t,” she weeps. “They’re better off without me. Safer. I can’t hurt them anymore if I’m gone.”

_The toxin is **you**. _

_People **die** when you’re in charge. _

_Everywhere you go, **death follows**. You’re the one we need saving from. _

Clarke presses her hands against her ears, digging her nails into her scalp as if that can keep the voices out. “Make them stop! _Please_.”

“Honey, listen to me.” Her dad speaks over the echoes of her friends’ cruel words. “You can’t give up. Madi needs you. Your friends need you. They’re not safe in Sanctum. You can help save them again, but you have to fight.”

“What if I don’t want to fight anymore?” Clarke asks him pleadingly. “What if I want to stay with you?”

“You can’t, sweetheart.” Her dad gives her a soft, heartbreaking smile. It’s the first touch of warmth in this darkness. “Your life isn’t over. Not yet.”

“I’m dead!” She shouts. What can’t he understand? “It _is_ over. And I’m tired of fighting. I’m so tired. I want _peace_. Why can’t I have peace?”

“You can,” He reassures her gently. “But not here. Not among ghosts.”

Clarke meets his eyes, silently pleading for him to have the answers. He always did. “What do I do, dad? Tell me what to do.”

He nods. There’s a glint of pride in his blue eyes. “First, get up.”

It’s harder than it should be. The floor calls to her. She could lie down and never get up. She could cry out all the tears she’s had to hold back, to mourn for what she’s lost. It would be so much easier to give up. She’s exhausted.

There’s always another fight. Another enemy. Another thing trying to kill her and those she cares about. Her friends still hate her for her impossible choices. What is there to go back to? More pain and suffering.  

But what if he’s right? What if there’s a chance her people need her? _Madi_ needs her. She’s a nightblood. Russell could turn to her as the next vessel. Clarke can’t let that happen.

She pushes up from her knees, getting to her feet. Her dad’s hand on her back steadies her. Clarke turns into him, taking another look at his warm, familiar face.

“I missed you,” she whispers, watching his eyes crinkle in the corners with his smile.

“Me too, kiddo.” He presses a kiss to the crown of her head. “I’m here for you now.”

He is. Clarke feels his presence with her as she forces herself to walk to the next door. Instinct guides her, somehow knowing she has to go through another doorway. She has to face another sin.

This time, she steps out of the Dropship and encounters a sea of charred Grounder bodies. The scent of burnt flesh makes her gag, her eyes watering. Once she collects herself, Clarke moves forward. The door shuts behind her and she is alone at the Dropship sight. Alone with the corpses of those she burned.

“I am become Death,” Clarke mutters to herself. “The destroyer of worlds.”

She stands there for a while, forcing herself to look at the charred remains. To breathe them in. Tears drip silently down her cheeks. She is sorry for killing them. Sorry for the war she never wanted to fight.

“I dreamt of the Ground,” Clarke adds quietly.  “I wanted to see the trees. I wanted to keep the 100 safe. They were just kids. _We_ were just kids.”

She thinks of the things they could have done differently. The bombs, the peace talks, her grudge against Wells. Maybe she should have tried harder to work with Lincoln and Anya for a ceasefire. Maybe none of it would have mattered and they were outfitted for war from the moment they fell from the sky.

A memory surfaces as she stands there, of the day they planned to leave for Luna’s Kru at the sea. Bellamy stood beside her, younger, lamenting the eighteen kids they had lost.

“Eighty-two alive,” she told him then. “You did good here, Bellamy.”

Clarke takes a breath, searching for a sliver of the clean pine air. She thinks she understands now. _You have to forgive yourself_. That’s what her dad said. What he’s asking sounds impossible. But Clarke has to try. If there’s a chance she can leave this hellscape and return to her people, her life, she has to try.

“Eighty-two alive,” Clarke repeats to herself. “Eighty-two alive. Eighty-two alive.”

Slowly, it works. The dead clear from the ground around her. In their place are the faces of the 100 kids she was sent to the Ground with. The familiar faces of her friends. They survived their time here because of what she did. 

What Bellamy did. What Raven did. What Monty did. They survived together.

Clarke never held these deaths against her friends. She understood their actions. They were protecting their own. Why should she hold them against herself?

When Clarke blinks again, she’s standing in the white hallway. The Dropship is gone. Her dad stands before her wearing a proud smile. “You deserve peace, Clarke.”

Maybe she does.

 

* * *

 

She goes from door to door. Each one is difficult and painful, some more than others. Clarke has to relive her grief. She feels the burden of her choices pressing against her shoulders all over again.

Did she do the right thing? Was there a better choice?

Clarke has no answers. The only thing she knows is she has to accept her actions and make peace with what she’s done. She mourns for the dead. She apologizes to those she has hurt. And she vows to do better if— _when_ —she gets a second chance.

Clarke is reaching the end of the hallway when she stops before another door. Her heart aches preemptively. Because she knows what lies beyond it. She knows what she still regrets, what she wishes she could fix.

Her eyes find her dad beside her. “I’m scared,” she admits.

He gives her arm a gentle squeeze. “I know, kiddo. You can do this. You’ll feel better when you do.”

She knows he’s right. The burden lessens slightly with each door she closes. Peace feels a lot like taking a free breath without something constricting her lungs.  

Clarke is afraid to feel this way again. It hurt horribly the first time. And if she’s being honest, even in death the betrayal is still devastating. Deep in her chest, her heart is not fully healed, but cracked and seeping blood. An open wound.

She finds the strength to open the door. Clarke enters the dim room in the bunker. The glow of candlelight illuminates the scene—an image from her nightmares. The ceremony that was about to take place is halted, suspended in time.

Madi lays unconscious on a stone slab. The members of Wonkru that are supposed to be gathered around the door are missing. As is Gaia. Only Bellamy gapes back at her, speechless in his shock, his arms dangling in the air.

Seeing her daughter like that again, Clarke burns with the urge to do the same as she did before. She will set the bunker and Wonkru on fire if it means keeping Madi safe.

 _She is safe,_ her conscious reminds her. _Bellamy protected her._

Clarke grapples to remember that now. She can’t see anything past Madi’s unconscious body, wearing the symbol of the Commanders. Her worst fear come true.

“How _could_ you?” Clarke demands, storming up to him. Tears dampen her eyes. “I asked you to protect her! I _begged_ you, Bellamy!”

He is calm in the face of her rage. Only pain and regret glisten in his dark eyes. “I did. You know I’ll protect her with my life, Clarke.”

She withstands the itch in her blood to shove at him, to slap, to kick and _hurt_ for how he has hurt her. Her best friend. She never thought he’d betray her like this.

“I didn’t want this either,” Bellamy murmurs, reading her thoughts. “I was trying to save you.”

“Your _family_ , you mean,” Clarke retorts bitterly. “You did this to save them. You risked my family for yours.”

“No,” Bellamy bursts, suddenly a spark in him that is familiar. “That’s not true, Clarke. I wanted to save _everyone_. That includes you and Madi. You’re my family too.”

She shakes her head, hugging her arms around her aching chest. No. He left her chained up. He broke his promise to her. They were supposed to go to the Valley _together_. He left her first.

“I _had_ to,” Bellamy insists. The fire in his voice is welcoming, even in her fury. God, she misses him. “I had to keep us from another war. I’m sorry, Clarke. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“I know,” Clarke breathes, the anger melting out of her. “You were thinking with your head. But you broke my heart.”

Suddenly, he is there, with no space between them. Bellamy presses his forehead to hers. She inhales his scent, a sad smile curving her lips. Her hands cling onto the fabric of his jacket, holding him close to her.

“I’m sorry, Bellamy,” Clarke croaks. “I was so angry. But I shouldn’t have left you to die. I should have come back. I should have—”

“Shh,” Bellamy hushes her, the shape of his calloused hands soothing on her back, in her hair. “It’s okay, Clarke. I already forgave you. Just forgive yourself.”

How? How can she forgive herself? She betrayed the man she loves. She could have been the cause of his _death_. Clarke doesn’t deserve to be free of that guilt.

“It isn’t about what we think we deserve,” Bellamy reminds her softly. “If you need forgiveness, I’ll give that to you. You’re forgiven. Let it go, Clarke.”

Hot tears streak down her face. She isn’t sure if she’s crying from shame or grief.

“Come back to me,” Bellamy whispers.

 _This isn’t real_ , Clarke reminds herself. She can’t get lost in the fantasy again. If she wants to see Bellamy, she has to fight back. She has to make peace with what happened.

Bellamy fades away, leaving Clarke cold and clutching at her own arms. The regret in her chest becomes a sharp aching to see the faces of her family again. To hold Madi in her arms. To see her mother’s smile in person. She wants them all back.

Her dad is waiting for her in the hallway. Half of her is at war with herself because she doesn’t want to say goodbye to him either.

He tucks Clarke into his arms. “We’ll meet again, kiddo. I promise.”

Clarke pushes back her tears. This isn’t goodbye. She’ll see him on the other side. In a place much warmer than this.

“Are you ready?” He asks her.

She nods. “I’m ready.”

Her dad steps back. He is already beginning to disappear, his colors bleaching out. His eyes are as bright as she remembers them, though, identical to her own.

“Wake up, Clarke,” he instructs her. “Your body is your own. It doesn’t belong to Josephine. It’s yours. Your fight is not over.”

“My fight is not over,” Clarke repeats, conviction making her voice fierce, echoing.

The doors vanish one by one. The darkness is coming back, eating away at the light. But Clarke isn’t afraid now. Her body is regaining sensation. She can feel her own legs; the weight they hold up. The tingling in her fingers and toes. Cold air on her skin.

She pushes through the darkness, swimming up the surface. Her head throbs and she embraces it. She welcomes the pain. A scream pierces the air and Clarke knows it’s hers. Her own mind reclaiming itself.

Clarke’s eyes fly open. They dart around frantically, everything too bright and harsh on her weakened sight. She blinks against the artificial light.

“ _Clarke_?”

The broken, deep voice washes her in warmth, in the feeling of home. No one says her name like he does. Pleasant shivers race down her spine. _Bellamy_.

He’s hovering in front of her, his hand reaching out like he’s afraid to touch. His brown eyes are wide and liquid. They shine with a glimmer of hope.

“It’s me,” Clarke whispers. She’s crying again, her words cracked and hoarse. It feels like she hasn’t seen his face in a lifetime.

Bellamy stands still. He wants to believe it’s her, she thinks. He held on to hope that she was there, still alive. He didn’t give up on her. She _loves_ him.

Clarke steps down from the chair was lying on, moving on shaky legs. There are others gathered on the outskirts of the unfamiliar cabin they’re in, but she only has eyes for Bellamy.

He wants to reach out for her. She can detect the longing plain in his eyes, at conflict with his uncertainty. “It’s you?” Bellamy repeats, skeptical.

Clarke doesn’t know what happened in the time since Josephine’s consciousness was planted in her. But something went wrong. It was enough to make Bellamy hesitate now. To doubt her.

Resolve straightens her spine. Clarke tilts her head up, speaking only to him. “You saved my life today.”

Bellamy’s brows draw together, his face lined with confusion. She almost smiles.

“You may be a total ass half the time,” she continues slowly. “But…”

She trails off, watching her words roll over him. His eyes light up with recognition, then immediately squeeze shut as tears soak them. His hands tremble at his sides.

Clarke steps closer to him, speaking through the quiver in her bottom lip. “I need you. I’ve _always_ needed you, Bellamy.”

He reaches out, crushing her against his chest. Clarke locks her arms around him, squeezing as tightly as he is clinging onto her. Her face buries in his neck, breathing in his scent. She never wants to let go again.

Bellamy sobs into her hair. The pained sound is beautiful because it’s _real_ and it’s him. Not a memory.

“I thought I lost you again,” Bellamy rasps.

 _You could never lose me,_ Clarke thinks. _I’m yours._ Even in death, she was his.  

“I’m here,” Clarke says, speaking against his skin. He shivers. “I’m back.”

 

* * *

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I'd love to hear what you guys think.


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